We All Live on Turtle Island

Posted on Jul 22, 2010

Alice pondered the information and then the Mock Turtle longingly recalled his earlier life, wiping tears from his eye with his paddle. “You may not have lived much under the sea,” he said, “so you can have no idea what a delightful thing a Lobster Quadrille is.” “What sort of a dance is it?” Alice asked. “Why, you first form into a long line along the seashore,” the Gryphon said. “Two lines!” the Mock Turtle added. “Seals, turtles, salmon, and so on; then you’ve cleared all the jellyfish out of the way. ...” “It must be a very pretty dance,” Alice said. “Would you like to see it?” responded the Mock Turtle, happy to demonstrate this part of his past. “Very much indeed!” Alice said, and the Gryphon and Mock Turtle went on to perform the Lobster Quadrille. And then the moment passed but the Gryphon wanted the show to go on. “Would you like the Mock Turtle to sing you a song?” the Gryphon asked Alice. “Oh, a song please, if the Mock Turtle would be so kind,” Alice replied. “Sing her ‘Turtle Soup,’ will you, old fellow?” the Gryphon urged. And once again, the soulful turtle began to sob, belting out the tale of his own demise:

Beautiful Soup, so rich and green,
Waiting in a hot tureen!
Who for such dainties would not stoop?
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Beau—ootiful Soo—oop!
Beau—ootiful Soo—oop!
Soo—oop of the e—e—evening,
Beautiful, beautiful Soup!

Years later, I was the one who was crying when, during a shamanic journey involving hundreds of people at an airport hotel (click here for full story), I had a vision of my maternal grandmother handing me a vial of tears—my own—as I stood under a Joshua tree in a trance. Along that subterranean path there was a giant desert tortoise; he had accompanied me to the rocky shrine where I received the gift that changed my life, and since then I have been comforted to know that even though I don’t always see them, tortoises are in the Mojave when I am and, more important, when I’m not. Yet I sometimes feel the urge to be near them, and when I do, I drive north from Los Angeles, a latter-day Alice dropping through a freeway sinkhole and emerging at their home in the Desert Tortoise Natural Area near California City.

There’s a famous old tortoise named Mojave Max at Red Rock Canyon in Nevada, and every year school kids bet on the moment when he will crawl out from his burrow after hibernating all winter. In the springtime and into the summer, I like to walk the paths of the Antelope Valley preserve, hoping to get lucky; you can spot a tortoise burrow near the base of the creosote bush, and I sometimes plant myself near one and wait for the ancient critter to reappear. In the meantime, plenty of other desert entertainment abounds. If the rains have come, the preserve is a blaze of glory, with the violet Mojave aster popping on the desert floor, yellow seas of goldfield rippled by the winds, and purple and white profusions of flowers on the calyx bush. Red-tailed hawks and woodpeckers and cactus wrens frequent the tortoise habitat, and of course snakes and lizards and tarantulas also call it home, as do the ground squirrel and badger and coyote.

Once there were vast cities of tortoise in the Colorado and Mojave deserts of California. During the 1920s, there were a thousand of the creatures per square mile. By 1990, the state reptile had become officially endangered. Its habitat was degraded by decades of unchecked cattle grazing, and off-roaders had begun to take their toll. Today there is a profusion of ravens in the desert, because ravens follow what people throw away, and parts of the desert are strewn with leftovers. When they’re finished, they turn to tortoise hatchlings. On the 40 square miles of the sanctuary outside California City, and elsewhere across the Mojave, the desert tortoise is making what may be its last stand. As it happens, this is no ordinary reptile fighting for its life (not that that makes its struggle any less compelling), but a reptile that may actually be like Skipperdee and the Mock Turtle. That is to say, it has a personality, according to a study made several years ago by U.S. Geological Survey biologist Kristin Berry. That critters have certain traits and feelings is not news to me, but if such “news” can stave off extinction, I’m all for it.

Berry studied the tortoise population at the Army base of Fort Irwin, before the animals were relocated to make way for expanded military maneuvers. After outfitting tortoises with transmitters, she learned that No. 43, for instance, a 10-pound alpha male, was actually a bully who turned to mush whenever he looked at a female. “But he was a heck of a fighter,” she told a Los Angeles Times reporter. “And he patrols a huge territory. We’ve seen him make arduous journeys across a wash and halfway up a mountain just to beat up a smaller male.” Then there was No. 41, an old, reclusive female with osteoporosis. She had four boyfriends, preferring them to the alpha males who occasionally visited her. No. 28 was an 80-year-old “cad” and “fearless kingpin.” Soon 300 of the Fort Irwin tortoises would be moved to similar habitat. “There’s so much we don’t know about these creatures,” Berry said.

“NaturalScientist”‘s evident distaste for all the, “red meat” of “terrestrial” Life,
and his stated preference for the (ideally?) flesh-less and blood-less conditions
he imagines (mistakenly) to be characteristic of the “celestial” realms, plus his
continued (feigned?) employment of pop-culturally youthful argot in his
comments here, all suggest the typical confusion of homo domesticus about
the free wild Song ‘n’ Dance of Life Herownself and the whole, healthy
expression of it we have here in the Natural Living Arrangement of our Mother
Earth. Besides, such agonizing dissatisfaction is easily remedied. There must
be fifty ways to leave your Mother, many of them relatively pain-less.

Meantime, if he doesn’t want to be bitten on the ass (or, in the extreme case,
his throat gone-for) quite so often while he remains here among us Savages,
“NaturalScientist” might be a little more respectful toward the “bitch” he is
himself a (bastard?) son-of. Pay better attention to Her, and the “Dude” might
find The Way past his current adolescent obsession with “blood and gore,” and
all The Way to the recognition and acceptance of the Natural Fact that “as on
Earth, so in Heaven,” like-it-or-lump-it.

Anyhow, here in Indian Country we do have a Way to know. It’s to go and see.
It just takes the courage of what one claims to be his convictions. Maybe
“NaturalScientist” will come back and tell us what he finds out about any
essential differences (other than imagined and semantic ones) between things
“celestial” and “terrestrial” here in “the Cosmos.” Or is he just wishfully
thinking out-loud?

And that’s UNCLE Shaman to you, “Peace Dude.” Your Auntie Shaman is up
south on HummingBird Island these Days, a bloody “inconvenient truth” about
which even Al Gore still hasn’t a clue.

“Hey dudes! Let’s grab the Hummer and go out and play Nature, maybe we’ll see some tortoises, coyotes, or mustangs and stuff.”

“Righteous Dude!” “Let’s go!, remember now, when we leave the hummer, watch out for snakes… bummer!” “Oh, Gila Monsters, which is it, red on black, or black on red”? “I always forget which is which”

“I love this Nature thing, man, it helps me to get away from the world, and forget who I am.” “It’s a nice diversion from all the blood and gore.” “Ya ya, there’s blood and gore out here, but at least its not human blood and gore… as long as you can dodge the snakes, and whatever.”

“Check it out man! I heard that a tortoise will climb a big mountain just to kick some ass and get a little tail.” “Ho-o-o-r-ny!”

“Yuh know what else? Bros who used to live here would eat cactus buds, get high, and dance all night.” “Now that’s cool!”

As a kid, I—like many in my neighborhood—had a desert tortoise as a pet.

Unfortunately, having one as a pet today is illegal, except through official government-sanctioned means. This is quite a pity, for many reasons.

First among these is that the desert tortoise is a marginal species, with or without mankind. In a typical clutch of desert tortoise eggs, almost no hatchlings live beyond a few days, because predators eat them (ravens being the worst offenders).

In captivity, almost all those hatchlings would survive and get sold Then the cycle could be repeated. Soon, there would be plenty of desert tortoises.

They make great pets: they don’t bark, bite, disturb the neighbors, or leave lots of manure lying around.

Another interesting sidebar is the fact that cattle ranching in Nevada actually helped INCREASE the population of desert tortoises, because ruminants would eat vegetation down to the ground, forcing new growth for the tortoise to eat. Also, ranchers dig water-retention basins, which not only water the cattle, but also other wildlife, including tortoises.

The desert tortoise situation shows that the old environmentalist canard, “Man bad for nature,” is not necessarily true. The decline in ranching in Nevada has coincided with the decline of the wild tortoise population; making it illegal in most cases to keep desert tortoises may be the final nail in their coffin.

Somehow I feel uncomfortable with this article in that it reminds me of someone who has been to an acupuncturist for an office visit and now feels they are an expert? I am reminded of politicians becoming self flagellating experts on everything and telling people what they are to believe or allowed to do. Worse pious religious leaders deciding on when women should be stoned or lashed. Leaving it to the people who told the story seems slightly short minded,..... let Hollywood screw the tail.

If Turtle Island is a mirth a myth or a classic possibly even real, who tells the story tellers in the first place? Now since I am of Norwegian decent, I should only tell tall tails about the Vikings, for that makes me an expert?

By the way, what is the difference between a tortoise a turtle and a rabbit, I thought turtles where part amphibious and tortoises lived on land? And, the not so great myth about a race.

Right on! Any time there is an addition in the form of a writer or author who appreciates the natural world, its complexities, but most important, its peril at the hands of humans, I say “thank you!”

Deanne, you are a much needed addition not only to Truthdig, but to the world. (for overall balance. I love Truthdig; nothing intended to criticize this website!)

Chris Hedges has written about what the natural world does for him. It is moving, alive and filled with passion. Your prose is too.

I’m about to order your book on the plight of the Wild Mustangs. I just heard Madeline Pickens interviewed recently over the continued slaughter and cruel round ups sponsored by BLM. My God, what has the natural world done to deserve us? What a mess.

Here’s what Earth needs: Zero Population Growth. I will always be on the side these creatures. It kills me to read of their descension toward extinction, or when literal extinction actually takes place. When will we wake up and get there are too damn many of us?

It is clear from “gerard”‘s contributions here that she(?) (There’s something rather grandmotherly about their ‘tone’ and particular concerns, but apologies if I’ve guessed wrong.) is thoughtful and caring, and genuinely troubled by the road our domesticated Human relatives are being driven-down. She needn’t fear that our People will “give-up” on hers, either, though not so much because we’re all (as she says) Two-leggeds together, as because it’s simply not in our free wild nature to be making such determinations. It’s totally outside our given area-of-responsibility, you might say.

Besides, even though I and my nephew “TAO Walker” have been describing in-detail the increasingly dire condition homo domesticus’ “condition” is in, and offering observations about its origins and “prognosis” that are perhaps unflattering to many, we’ve done so in-part to demonstrate our well-grounded understanding of the disease we ‘diagnose,’ and it’s effects on them and the rest of us, and in-part to establish some valid ‘credentials’ to ‘prescribe’ the Medicine we do (Call it, today, The Way of Genuine Living Human Community.) as the specific remedy for what ails them and our Mother Earth. We’re under no illusions, though, about the extreme difficulty of getting this information past the filters and censors the “civilization” syndrome itself has installed in its sufferers’ “individual”-ized cognitive equipment, with the specific purpose of keeping them completely ignorant of the real nature of their plight.

It seems to me the more likely possibility now is that the tame peoples will soon despair of the essential goodness of their own essential Human Nature (after hearing it denigrated incessantly for ten thousand years), “give-up” altogether on Life Herownself, and choose to give-in entirely to the temptation of their retro-viral tormentors’ false promise of perpetual ‘un-death,’ instead. Some commenting here and there on this site suggest glibly that the (ultimately) complete substitution of artificial ‘mechanism’ for natural organism offers “modern” humans the best, even only way out of their current partly self-inflicted misery. All I can say to that ploy is to note it was the desperation of exactly their own identical self-inflicted dead-end condition that brought those “destroyers-of-worlds” here in-the-first-place, looking for at-least an end to it, if not a Way through it offering some chance for them to come out fully alive again, as they once were ages ago.

The Living Arrangement of our Mother Earth, including us free wild Human Beings and All Our Relations (including our captive sisters and Brothers), is the actual Medicine Life Herownself came-up-with as the Living Response to their need. It remains to be seen now only whether they’ll accept or reject it, which is again (I’m happy to say.) outside Humanity’s area-of-responsibility.

It’ll sure be good, though, for all the “beautiful babies” of every Kind, if the tormentors and their two-legged tools will just decide it’s better to let-go their “great pride” than it will be to fall with it, finally, into oblivion. We’ll all be alright either way, of course, which really frosts their asses. ‘Cause misery indeed does “love” company, and they were so damned certain they had US in-the-bag.

Oh how great are perils of not minding own business awaiting us and the calamities, iniquities, slaughters that are behind us and greater yet to come.

No, dianne wld not tell u this nor point the people who taught us—-nay, commanded—-not to mind our own business.

And in US, ab 98% of people do not mind own affairs; solely, because 0001% of people told them for 400 yrs: never mind, this is for us to decide!

Dianne is allowed to write on TD, but i am not. And not necessarily me, but one of us: 000001% of world pop.
And if we continue not minding our lives; others wld more than gladly step in to do it for u.
And they have been doing that to us for at least 10 k yrs! tnx

Since this simplicity a child cld understand and agree with it and most posters on TD having voted for the 0001 percenters, most people wld disagree with the simlicity, but wld understand it! tnx

There is a difference between the terrestrial and the celestial. I don’t claim to know, because it’s beyond knowing, but I believe there is no blood and gore in the Cosmos. I believe blood, gore, predation, tribal warfare, clannishness, and the like, are terrestrial, not celestial.

Are we all “into” the Cosmos? I believe the Cosmos scares the crap out of a lot of people. We are “in” the Cosmos, good point, which grade did we learn that in?

Is there such a thing as the “anti-Shaman”? If there is, I’ll bet he’s giving too much credence to the terrestrial, while giving little significance to the infinite celestial.

Of course, this discussion can only be food (No red meat) for thought. The only thing I know for sure is that there is a lot of gore here on Mother Earth. I believe focusing more on the celestial, other worldly, could help us to reduce all the blood and gore here on Earth. I believe that rather than celebrate Mother Nature, we should recognize that she is sometimes a mean bitch that kisses you on the cheek, just before she goes for your throat.

Truthdig needs a good solid column on natural history and ecological concerns. Can you please find someone who doesn’t indulge in sentimental, patronizing twaddle?

It’s insulting to equate Eloise at the Plaza with Native American stories based on observations of the natural world. It’s ridiculous to come up with lines like: “Who will teach us the Mojave quadrille?”

The earth is being smothered by pesticides and industrial residue, and the oceans by plastic garbage. The atmosphere is starting to cook. Unless we wise up quickly, no one will be doing any quadrilles—Mojave or mock turtle or otherwise.

We subscribe to Truthdig for hard-hitting, straightforward news and opinion. Please give us some on these subjects.

Enough navel gazing, pseudo-spirituality by those who are insulated from living a “natural” life. Send this woman back to Sedona or Santa Fe, where she can journey shamanically with the rest of the white phonies.

Old Man Turtle et al: Please don’t give up on us.
(I almost do, every day. Then I think of how we are all two-leggeds and our babies are so beautiful and I tell myself: “Hang in there! It ain’t over till it’s over.”)

“NaturalScientist” betrays an ignorance of both Nature and science, when he compares Earth to a “psychopathic killer,” and attributes traits like “dumb, cruel, and vicious,” which in-fact are found only among domesticated Humans (of which he appears to be one) to “animals” (He is one for sure.), which he claims to “like” despite their alleged “brute”-ish proclivities. Anyhow, it’s never the “tsunami, earthquake, hurricane, tornado, etc” actually taking sometimes heavy tolls on the half-lives of his Kind. It’s always their own insistence on trying to occupy permanently places susceptible to the natural effects of those and similar events, a pretty good example of “dumb,” while most mere “animals” have the good sense to get out of harm’s way, if some tame two-legged hasn’t corralled them, or just to stay out of it altogether.

Which brings us to the urban legend of “blood lust” among Coyotes, Cougars, and Wolves. If “Natural Scientist” really knew anything about it he’d know the organic function of so-called “predatory” animals is to help those (like sheep) with no internal “population control” capability from breeding themselves to starvation. So when Coyote sees two hundred sheep crammed into a fifty-foot-square pen (another “dumb” thing domesticated Humans do) He just naturally reduces their numbers to something nearer that confined areas “carrying capacity.”

That’s Nature, though most of “science” has yet to catch-up with Her in the Wisdom department.

“NaturalScientist”‘s reference to “when (he) was a boy” is a bit mystifying, because, boy howdy, the “dude” sure comes across as being one still. What exactly does being “into the cosmos” mean? I mean, who isn’t?

I liked Ms Stillman’s article about the mustangs so much that I read her book. It wasn’t my first introduction to the plight of the wild horses, that was as a kid reading ‘Mustang, Spirit of the West,’ by Marguarite Henry. The mustangs were gathered for slaughter.

I am a little uncomfortable about her identification with Native American spiritual life. There are some things that shouldn’t be talked about unless they are your own.

Maudlin sentimentality is indeed a barrier, that prevents the “new age” White from experiencing the powerful, fearsome and transformative living natural energies alive, on the American Continent. Robert the Bears old adage, that there may be forces alive inside us, that brown rice and meditation can’t placate, illustrates my suspicion of a “chrystal gazeing-little pink angels-lift it up into the violet light of the heart”, manufactured and sold, spiritual reality. The authors self-deprecating and apologetic use of the word “gringo” disappoints me.

The elephant in the room for new agers is their guilt about and self-denial of the White potentiality for violence and its’ history, as if polite political correctness and conversation can avert recognition of the blood that stains and has now, with this fascist war, come to define all our lives. The real suprise of course is to find ourselves as abandoned, defeated, exploited and alone, as Blacks, Browns, Yellows and Reds. This is, perhaps, if we can find common ground, salvation for us all. And, I feel it important to say, that some of us are free men and don’t give a #@%k about skin color.

I remember the authors article on horses in the American West. And, I enjoyed this one. Her attempt to validate the living force of both our inner and outer worlds, and honor the connection to a third, is important. We need that dialogue to fight the emotional ice of the “plastic fantastic lover” who is destroying us. As a fellow Westerner I look forward to reading her.

Christ said plainly that the Kingdom is not someplace else. It is here, and men do not have the eyes to see it. Where are these “eyes” of which He speaks?

I have a healthy respect for nature and Mother Earth, in all her carnality. I’m thankful for her many gifts, but she does make me a little nervous sometimes, just as a psychopathic killer makes me a little nervous sometimes. You never know when she will put a whup-ass tsunami, earthquake, hurricane, tornado, etc. on you.

I also like animals. When I was a boy our family had a black Labrador retriever. He was a great pet, full of loyalty and love. Like most male Labrador Retrievers he was” laid back” and very affectionate. Unlike his mother, the stupid bitch, he wasn’t into chasing cars. He was a macho dude, and he kicked some serious ass when a boxer from a small farm not far away encroached on his turf. He also got his ass kicked when he encroached on the boxer’s turf.

Anyway, our family pet was beloved in our neighborhood, and the neighbors used to feed him their table scraps. Once he followed me to a Boy Scout meeting, and he got hit by a car when I sent him home. After being hit by the car he hobbled away. The neighborhood grocer called my father and the whole neighborhood was up all night looking for him. Fortunately, he was discovered in our garage the next morning, and he recovered nicely from the loss of a kidney.

Alas, our friendship faltered when I discovered he had a penchant for viciously killing kittens. Also, his pink thing coming out was something of a put off.

Like I said, I like animals, even if they are dumb, cruel, and vicious brutes. Some animals have a blood lust that is unfathomable. If you put some animals in a coral of sheep, they’ll kill every last sheep before having their snack.

We all have our myths, affinities, and superstitions. I’m into the cosmos, not nature with its predatory violence. The cosmos is the bomb; it’s the king of the unfathomable. Dude! Check it out! The cosmos will boggle your mind into the realm of WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ad infinitum.

Meaning no disrespect to Ms. Stillman, but couldn’t ‘truthdig’ have found an actual Native Person to reacquaint the rest of her sub-species (call it today homo ‘disconnectus’) with “the West”? And how come American children’s stories about Turtle are beloved “classics,” while ours is merely a “myth.”?

If this introductory article is indicative, all we’re likely to get from its author is more maudlin sentiment intended to confirm Americans’ already much overblown self-image as truly sensitive and caring refugee ‘princes’ and ‘princesses’ bravely “slumming” here, “accessing” some of the more easily reached “natural places,” and wallowing in illusions of being singled-out “individual”-ly for special communications from those places’ surviving (despite americorpse’s best efforts) inhabitants. This is all so ‘Sedona,’ with its commercialized exploitation of “Native American” culture by self-selected caucasians who presume to reveal and explain, to the equally ignorant, what they have no actual Personal knowledge-of themselves.

For example, us surviving free wild Turtle Island Natives don’t “live on (it),” the way most of our domesticated Human relatives think they live “on” Earth as, again, only temporary exiles or visitors or penitents “native” to some “heavenly” realm where they’re really “from.” We live indistinguishably within the whole of our Mother’s Living Arrangement here, to which we belong and not the-other-way-‘round.

There are many excellent writers among our People today who could maybe actually accomplish to some extent what Ms. Stillman says she wants to do. Did Robert Scheer or any of his editorial people even try to ‘recruit’ some of them to this effort? If not, is it because of a deep-seated (and likely fully justified) fear among Americans that they might be presented with information from us Turtle Islanders, of all Kinds, that knocks-for-a-loop the too pretty and too comfortable and too totally self-serving myths about theirownselfs and their “country”?

Thanks for the good word from the Wild West. We are all Earthlings on a spaceboat planet. Our only lifeboat is sinking but we are not bailing together. Our bickering over idiology may be our undoing. Now is our last chance to work together for peace and justice, before it is too late.